The Debian Project has released an update to its popular GNU/Linux distribution, with security-related bugfixes a key feature.

"This is the first update of Debian GNU/Linux 3.1 (codename 'Sarge') which mainly adds security updates to the stable release, along with some corrections to serious problems," said Debian security team member Martin Schulze in an e-mail announcing the update.

Schulze said systems administrators who regularly updated their Debian-based systems with security patches would not have to update much software.

The update contains fixes for 172 pieces of software, including high-profile entries like spam-buster SpamAssassin, Web browser Mozilla Firefox and its sister project the Thunderbird e-mail client, the PHP and Python scripting languages, Web server Apache and anti-virus software ClamAV, in addition to the Linux kernel.